Smoke jumpers risk lives to put out fires

EMMETT, Idaho (CNN) -- Their names were Rufus Robinson and Earl Cooley, and on July 12, 1940, they did something no other human had done. They jumped out of an airplane to battle a blazing fire.

Robinson and Cooley were part of a small band of courageous firefighters, the smoke jumpers, who took home $193 per month for the 2 1/2-month fire season for doing one of the most dangerous jobs in the world.

Today, more than 5,000 men and women are smoke jumpers, risking their lives during the hot and dry fire season to get up close and personal with raging wildfires to try to control them.

Forest fires predate humanity and the methods used to battle blazes are as old as mankind. But aerial methods are a very recent strategy.